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A Look Into My Fridgg

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For nearly two years now, I have been sharing my love of sushi with you. Every week, new sushi recipes or restaurant reviews. From reading Sushi Day, one might assume my entire life revolves around sushi – many are surprised that it does not.

Sushi is only one of many things I make in my kitchen. I love to bake, and I cook many other dishes as well. For quite some time now, I’ve been wanting to share my other food adventures with you, but I’ve found that Sushi Day isn’t quite the right forum for this.

So now, I begin a new chapter in my food blogging life. Don’t worry – Sushi Day won’t change one bit – but now when I want to write about something other than sushi, I have somewhere to do so. Thus I give you my new food blog…

Fridgg.com

While I have moved many of my non-sushi recipes over to my new blog from Sushi Day, I’ve also posted several new ones – my grandmother’s cheesecake recipe, a carrot cake recipe, my other grandmother’s spaghetti recipe, the recipe for deviled eggs that my mom uses, and my mother’s zucchini bread recipe.

I’ll still be the sushi girl, but now you get to see another side of my kitchen. 🙂

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Koo-Ki Sushi

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When you get deep into the sushi world, something that begins to come up is candy sushi. Often, people use Hostess Twinkies or Rice Crispy Treats as the sumeshi, with Fruit Roll-Ups for the nori. However, many have heard of Suedy’s Koo-Ki Sushi. These also use a rice crispy base, but use various types of chocolate, caramel, and gummy candies for their nori and sushi fillings. Often I have lusted over the delicious-sounding descriptions and beautiful pictures on their website, but I never believed I would actually try their candy sushi. At prices from $10 for a pair of chocolate chopsticks, to $65 for an entire bento box of candy sushi, the prices have always been a bit out of my range.

A couple of weeks ago, my mom called me. “You have a package coming tomorrow, will you be home?” I assured her I would be, curious about this unexpected package. “You’re going to love it,” she promised.

The next day, a delivery man came to my door with a light package. While I was signing for the box, he glanced at the return address, then looked at me with question in his eyes. “Sushi?” I smiled and nodded, not entirely sure what he was talking about. When I turned back into my apartment and took a look at the return address, my face lit up like a kid who just found out she gets to go to Disneyland. The name on the return address: Koo-Ki Sushi.

Turns out my mom had known about my desire to try the Koo-Ki Sushi candy sushi, so my parents decided to get me the candy sushi as a graduation gift. (Thanks Mom and Dad!) I was the lucky recipient of a Black Suedy’s Obento and a pair of Milk Chocolate Mocha Bean Choc Sticks (chopsticks). They came wrapped in a protective padding so the chocolate wouldn’t move around, with ice packs so the chocolate wouldn’t melt during the trip.

The first thing I did, after dancing around my apartment with a huge grin on my face of course, was take pictures of all the pieces in the box. Wouldn’t you? Heck yeah, you would. I had to sit on my hands the rest of the day so I wouldn’t get into the chocolate; I wanted to wait for Son to get home so we could both try every piece in the box.

Believe it or not, we did somehow manage to practice restraint – we limited ourselves to two pieces of chocolate each day. The first day, we just had to try the Apricot Row (gunkan-style maki) and Lemon-Egg (tamago nigiri). The Apricot Row was incredibly fun to eat. The “ikura” (salmon roe) were made of apricot-flavoured gummies, set on top of rice cookie “sumeshi” and wrapped with dark chocolate “nori.” The gummies were perfectly chewy, and although the texture was, of course, very different than a normal gunkan-maki would feel, it was delicious and enjoyable to eat. The Lemon-Egg was definitely my favorite Koo-Ki Sushi treat in the entire bento box. It consisted of a lemon-flavoured white chocolate “tamago” with lemon meringue filling, set on top of rice cookie “sumeshi” and wrapped with a very thin strip of dark chocolate “nori.” The lemon “tamago” tasted almost exactly like my favorite Girl Scout cookie of all time – a lemon sandwich cookie that used to be sold in my grandmother’s area. She used to always buy us several boxes, since they weren’t sold near us. (Side rant: I hate how the types of Girl Scout Cookies sold differs from district to district. Why not just have everyone sell the same cookies? Oh, how I miss those lemon sandwich cookies.) The white chocolate used for the “tamago” is incredibly creamy, and the rice cookie is perfectly crunchy, without being too dense.

Next, we tried some of the garnishes that came with the “sushi.” The Peach Blossom was a little flower-shaped piece of peach-flavoured white chocolate, on top of a flower-shaped rice cookie. Small, perfect for when you don’t want a lot of sweet, and subtly peach flavoured. Delicious. On the other hand, the Green Tea “Wasabi” didn’t quite do it for me. I didn’t taste any green tea, so it just seemed like a normal lump of green-colored white chocolate to me. Son enjoyed the SUEDY’S “Shoga” (ginger), which was ginger-flavoured white chocolate. I’m not a huge ginger fan, so I didn’t much like it, but if you enjoy the taste of ginger (like Son does) then you will like the ginger piece. The last garnish was a little plastic fish filled with dark chocolate “shoyu.” The flavour of this really reminded me of Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup… not quite the same taste as “real” dark chocolate, but not a bad taste at all.

The Great White Sushi was an ebi- (shrimp-) shaped piece of white chocolate on top of rice cookie “sumeshi,” with an almond filling and green tea “wasabi” between the “shrimp” and “sumeshi.” I thought this was the most beautiful piece in the box… I almost didn’t want to eat it! When I finally allowed myself to bite into it, I found that it was enjoyable, but there was an overwhelming amount of white chocolate. I would have preferred to have a better balance between the white chocolate and the rice cookie. (On a side note: I used to love white chocolate, until I OD’d on it when I was younger. Now, I can’t take too much white chocolate at one time, which could have influenced why I wasn’t so fond of this piece. Son, however, who absolutely loves white chocolate, enjoyed the piece quite a bit.)

The last two pieces in the box were both “maki” pieces. The first we tried was the Fruit-O-Maki (futomaki) which consisted of caramel and fruit-flavoured white chocolate “fillings,” surrounded by rice cookie “sumeshi” and dark chocolate “nori.” I thoroughly enjoyed this one. The white chocolate was super melt-in-your-mouth creamy, and there was a perfect balance between the fillings and the “sumeshi.” My only critique for this piece was that the caramel was a bit too chewy, so it detracted a little from the mouth-feel of the piece.

The Mau’i Maki (California Roll) was very interesting. This one was an inside-out roll, with piña colada-flavoured fillings and candy “tobiko” sprinkles on the outside. I did not like the fillings at all – I don’t enjoy the piña colada taste one bit. However the “tobiko” were fantastic. The little candy sprinkles very closely replicated the crunchy popping texture of real tobiko, so I thought they were an excellent choice to complement the roll.

But wait… we’re not done yet! Although that was all the pieces in the bento box (which by the way, is a very adorable bento box that you can wash and re-use for real bento!), I also received a pair of Milk Chocolate Mocha Bean Choc Sticks (chopsticks) as well. These are both beautiful and delicious. On the package, it recommends swirling them into your coffee, which I’ll bet would be delicious. However, I chose to eat them by themselves. At the bottom of the chopsticks, you only taste the milk chocolate, but as you reach the upper third of the chopsticks, you find that beneath the gold-dusted design, there is a crunchy coffee-flavoured inlay. These were quite pleasing to eat and beautiful to look at… I would definitely buy them again and try swirling them in my coffee this time.

All in all, I found that the Koo-Ki Sushi pieces were well-constructed, delicious, and worth their high price tag as a treat for special occasions. Would I make a habit of buying these? Most certainly not – my wallet wouldn’t survive a hit like that. However every once in a while, I wouldn’t mind trying these again.

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Koo-Ki Sushi ships everywhere in the United States, although there is an extra charge for shipments to Alaska and Hawaii. They do not ship to P.O. Boxes, and during summer months require overnight shipments to prevent melting of the chocolate. If you think the shipping costs are too expensive (and they are a bit pricey), you can also visit their store at 830 Jury Court, Suite 1, San Jose, CA, 95112.

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New Year’s Sushi

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If you haven’t already, head over to my “Contest Time” post and enter the contest to win one of five Sushi Day t-shirts in the size of your choice! Deadline is midnight PST next Saturday, so get entering!

Here’s a little peek into how my family celebrates New year’s: lots of sushi and plenty of other food to eat all day! Enjoy the pictures!

New Year's Sushi

Son caught me in the middle of making sushi on New year’s morning (yes, those are sushi pajama pants!)

New Year's Sushi

I made 10 rolls of the Bacon Crunchy Shrimp Roll.

New Year's Sushi

I made 5 rolls of a spicy-ish tuna roll (which I will post about soon) and 2 Rainbow Rolls (which I will also post about soon)

New Year's Sushi

Inari sushi from Sakae Sushi (our New Years sushi place!)

New Year's Sushi

Me cutting up the sushi at my uncle’s house (I cut them there because it is SO much easier to transport in rolls!)

New Year's Sushi

This is about half of the Bacon Crunchy Shrimp Rolls, cut up.

New Year's Sushi

Some of the sushi with sashimi in it (I had to keep the fish and non-fish sushi separated, because my mom is allergic to fish and my brother can’t eat sashimi or anything that has touched sashimi because his immunity is pretty low from the chemotherapy.)

New Year's Sushi

2 of the tuna rolls cut up, and both of the Rainbow Rolls.

New Year's Sushi

Our New year’s spread: 5 types of sushi, bulgogi, chicken fingers, won-tons with sweet and sour sauce, shrimp and cucumber sunomono. Not shown: asparagus, 2 kinda of fried rice, lemon squares, pecan tartlets, brownies, assorted other desserts. Oh, and Cool Whip. 😛

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Happy Mother’s Day!

Happy Mother’s Day everyone! Spoil your moms today, and if you are a mother then take the day to relax!

We’re off to celebrate with my mom’s side of the family at my grandmother’s house. We always go eat at my grandmother’s favorite restaurant (I have no idea what the name of the restaurant is… it’s a little hole-in-the-wall place). Afterwards, we will get our annual strawberries at one of the roadside fruit stands near my grandmother’s house… the best strawberries ever!

We went out to dinner yesterday with Son’s mom, since we are spending the day with my family today. We went to this Teppan grill called Wabi Sabi… I swear to goodness the chefs must have been trained at the same place as the chefs from Benihanas! The grill show was almost exactly the same, and all the food tasted the same… am I missing something??? I don’t think Wabi Sabi is owned by Benihanas…

This is one of the flower pictures that Son took in the gardens at the Getty

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Monday Sushi?

Last night, I was sitting at home watching TV (hehe no, I don’t really get out much on Friday nights!), and there was a 20/20 special discussing 10 common myths. One of these such myths is that you shouldn’t eat at restaurants on Mondays, because they might be using food that had been bought the past Friday to use up leftovers, rather than using food freshly bought that day. Although the food shouldn’t kill you, you probably aren’t getting your dollar’s worth. The special also discussed sushi restaurants. Although the special says you shouldn’t be too “concerned about the quality of Monday fish in restaurants in such coastal cities as San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, New York — that have “fish-centric” menus.” (such as sushi restaurants), it warns you against half-priced sushi, because it probably isn’t of the greatest quality. Of course hearing about sushi always makes my ears perk up, and I thought it might be something interesting to discuss with all of my wonderful SushiDay readers.

So what do you think about this? Do you go out to eat on Mondays? Have you ever gone to a restaurant with a half-price sushi special? If so, have you noticed any lack of quality or even gotten sick from it? What about restaurant size… would you be more willing to trust a large, popular restaurant or a smaller, family owned sushi bar? I really do want to hear from all of you, so leave your thoughts in the comments, or if you are to shy to comment you can contact me and we can communicate by e-mail instead. 🙂

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Happy Easter!

Happy Easter! Even though my family isn’t really religious, we still celebrate it every year. We spent some time yesterday dying eggs… my little brother was having a little too much fun doing it! We have these little plastic wrappers that you can put around the hard boiled eggs, then put them in boiling water to shrink-wrap them around the eggs. He ended up shrink-wrapping every one of his eggs to the little wire egg dippers (seen in this egg dying tutorial).. luckily we have a lot of egg dippers from previous years! And yes, we are technically a bit too old to be doing this… those of us dying eggs range in age from 14 to 25! (Well, my mom also did a few eggs, but I’m not telling you how old she is!)

Happy Easter!

Tomorrow morning we get to wake up and do an Easter egg hunt in our backyard… some traditions never get old, and for Son they are very new – last year was the first year he had ever dyed Easter eggs or done an Easter egg hunt! Growing up in Vietnam he had a lot of different traditions than those we have here in the U.S., so I have been introducing him to a lot of new things (carving pumpkins for Halloween, having a stocking for Christmas, dying Easter eggs, etc.). Later in the day we have a super yummy Easter dinner: ham, scalloped potatos, asparagus, and the best spinach dip in the world! (If you ask me nicely, I may just share the recipe!) Yum… I can’t wait!

Happy Easter!

So now I want to know, what are your Easter traditions? I have never celebrated Easter with anyone aside from my own family, so I would love to hear how your traditions differ from mine! Have a wonderful Easter!
Happy Easter!

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Five Things…

…You Didn’t Know About Me. I have been tagged!! Yvo from The Feisty Foodie tagged me for the “Five Things You Didn’t Know About Me” thing that’s going around (I think it’s contagious!), so here I am with my five things. I have been thinking about it all day, so here’s what I came up with!

  1. I have had plastic surgery. I know, it sounds really superficial, but I promise I’m not! I was in a car accident two years ago and broke my nose and caved in a small section of my forehead, so the plastic surgery (I got a nose job! Hehe) was to repair my face. It was the worst experience I have ever had, (well, I’m sure the car accident was worse, but I have no memory of it) so I can’t understand people who want to get plastic surgery!!!
  2. I have a birthmark that looks like a butterfly on my leg a few inches below my right hip. It’s interesting because for some unknown reason my friends have always associated me with butterflies and I have danced the part of a butterfly a few times. 🙂
  3. I am incredibly shy. I don’t like being around a lot of people, and if I am in a room with you, I almost definitely will not start a conversation with you. Not because I don’t like you, just because I am afraid of bothering you. I’m weird like that. 🙂 But if you talk to me first, then I’m glad to have a conversation with you! 🙂
  4. I met Son ballroom dancing. We had both tried out for a ballroom dance company at our university (he was a grad student at the time, I was an undergraduate) so we had to rehearse together. He thought I was older than I actually was (he was very surprised when he found out my actual age), and as he says, very down to earth. Hehe. We don’t dance anymore, (I wish we did, but we have no time!) but let me tell you, he is easily the best dance partner I have ever had! He’s a natural! 🙂
  5. I apparently have a very *talented* face. Nose and ears to be more precise. I can move each of my ears by itself, and I can twitch my nose like a bunny, kind of like Anne Hathaway in the Princess Diaries movies. I can twitch one nostril at a time too. Generally the reaction I get is either “You’re a freak!” or “Cool!!! Do it again!”

So there are my Five Things You Didn’t Know About Me. Yvo was right… it is difficult!

I tag:
Ralph from Damn Ralph
Son
and I re-tag Yvo from The Feisty Foodie because I want to know what that last thing you thought of was. 😉

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The Complete Book of Sushi

The Complete Book of Sushi
by Hideo Dekura, Brigid Treloar, Ryuichi Yoshii

“The Complete Book of Sushi” is perfect for not only the sushi newcomer, but also as a reference book for the sushi lover. It is extremely comprehensive, including information from sushi customs to rolling sushi, and even provides recipes for soups and sauces that are commonly eaten with sushi.

For example, if you are planning on throwing a party or having a picnic, it has tips on what sushi to make and how to prepare and store it so it will taste great for the party. It gives recommendations for serving and storing the sushi so it won’t make anyone sick or go bad from sitting out. The book also has many tips on presentation, with a wonderful section on garnishes and sauces to make your sushi look fantastic.

The book has a superb section about sharpening Japanese knives, which is great for anyone who is a hardcore sushi fan (like me!). There is a comprehensive section about the tools that are often used for sushi preparation, such as the fish scaler, rolling mat, hangiri and square omelet pan. There is also a nice list of less known sushi ingredients such as bonito flakes, daikon radish, kampyo, and miso, with explanations of what these ingredients are and how to prepare and store them for use in sushi.

There is a great section about selecting and preparing fish and other seafood for both sushi and sashimi. The book includes a recipe for sumeshi that is very similar to the recipe that I have included on SushiDay. There are recipes for futomaki-zushi (thick rolls), hosomaki-zushi (thin rolls), tempura, uramaki-zushi (inside-out rolls), nigiri-zushi, temaki-zushi (hand rolls), inari-zushi, gunkan maki-zushi (battleship sushi), chirashi-zushi (sushi in a bowl), soups, sashimi, and other decorative and creative sushi. In addition, there are several recipes for sauces and condiments that are often eaten with sushi.

Overall, I recommend this book for just about everyone! People who are new for sushi will love the easy-to-understand explanations, while those who have been in a long-term relationship with sushi will appreciate the in depth explanations about sharpening sushi knives and selecting fish, in addition to the more creative and innovative sushi recipes.


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Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone! I hope everyone has a safe and happy New Year’s celebration!

My SushiDay New Year’s resolution is to make lots of new and different sushi, and to try to prepare and use some raw fish in my sushi this year! My personal resolutions are to do really well in school and get back in shape. 🙂

So what are your New Year’s resolutions? Hopefully they include eating and making a lot of sushi! 😀